From teen modelling and tabloid stings to car rallies and showjumping, Jodie
Kidd has led a colourful life, so will this jet-setter slow down now that
she is a mother?

Jodie Kidd has spent much of the morning standing in a muddy field in a ballgown and gold heels, in front of a battalion of photographers. There is hairspray and horses, and in the background a constant soundtrack of sheep, baa-ing. She has just bid farewell to her father, who has returned to his home in Canada, where he lives with a woman half his age, and tomorrow she will fly to Barbados to visit her mother, who lives on the Caribbean island (then it’s on to Argentina to see her polo-playing boyfriend, though more of that later).

I ask, somewhat jokily, if Mum – who divorced Dad not long ago – had yet started an affair with her tennis coach. This is met with shrieks of laughter. “Oh my god,” she squeals. “What kind of image do you have of our family? I don’t think my mother has ever played a game of tennis in her life! You make us sound like something out of a Jilly Cooper novel.”

It’s not hard to make the Kidds sound like something out of a Jilly Cooper novel – they do a pretty good job all by themselves. First, the small matter of Jodie’s mother and father. Johnny, the son of Lord Beaverbrook, and Wendy, the daughter of a baronet, divorced in 2006 after 33 years of marriage. He now lives with his young girlfriend, a Hollywood stuntwoman.

Then there is Jodie’s older brother, Jack, who left the mother of his four children, an American heiress, around the same time that his parents’ marriage was ending. His ex-wife, Be Kemeny, is said to have sent an email to his friends detailing his numerous infidelities, before throwing the family computer in a lake. Jack now has a young son with his 23-year-old girlfriend, Callie, who was a student when they met. Jodie’s sister, Jemma, is a successful make-up artist who is married to Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Mornington and grandson of the Earl of Wellington (Jemma is the Countess of Mornington).

But it is Jodie herself who has had the most colourful of lives among the Kidd clan. As a young teenager, she was spotted in Barbados by photographer Terry O’Neill – six feet five in heels, with fabulous bone structure and feline eyes, she was always going to attract attention. “I did modelling because I wanted to have enough money to buy a horsebox,” says Jodie, now 32 and a keen showjumper. She could never have imagined what was to happen next.

As a passionate horserider, she was naturally skinny, which led to something of a media furore. She was accused of being anorexic and of taking heroin, though neither of these things were true. Yet there was a lot of partying, and, in 2007, Jodie became the victim of a sting by the News of the World after she reportedly offered to buy cocaine for undercover reporters, whom she believed were interested in setting up a polo business with her.

Jodie also boasted to reporters of her friendships with Princes William and Harry, as well as Zara Phillips, and called the Duke of Edinburgh “mad”. She admitted to taking cocaine herself. And so, Jodie was quietly dropped from various modelling contracts, including a lucrative one with M&S. An 18-month marriage to “internet entrepreneur” Aiden Butler also ended around the time of the scandal.

So far, so Jilly Cooper. But now we have the next chapter of Jodie Kidd’s life: motherhood. She gave birth to her son, Indio, just nine weeks ago, and goes gooey at the mere mention of his name. “Please, let’s not talk about him, or I will just want to run back home to him right now. I’m like this mother hen clucking around her egg.” She has a place in Sussex, and one in Argentina, birthplace of her boyfriend, Andrea Vianini, a professional polo player and horse breeder.

They have known each other for 20 years; Vianini is a good friend of her brother’s. “It just clicked with us. I don’t know what really happened,” she says, smiling. “He was my friend and then it was like, 'Oh, we’re going to have a baby and a family and it is going to be great.’ So, yes, it’s all quite mad. But I think knowing each other quite well is a help, because we didn’t have to go through the rigmarole of finding out each other’s annoying habits.”

They have no plans to get married. “We are very relaxed and both think: 'Why do you want to get married? It will ruin everything!’ We have this wonderful baby and a lovely life between England and Argentina and Uruguay. Plus, weddings are a nightmare to organise. Oh God, the table plans!” A look of exasperation crosses her oh-so fresh face. “No, what a dreadful thought. We’re happy just plodding along.”

Professionally, too, life is looking up. Having not been allowed on her beloved horses for the duration of her pregnancy, she is now set to get involved in the world of carriage driving – imagine a horse-drawn carriage, but ramped up to the nth degree and pulled through a variety of obstacle courses (she is hoping to take part in the London International Horse Show this Christmas). It’s extreme horse riding.

But then, Jodie is no stranger to extreme sports. She regularly takes part in the Gumball 3,000-mile international road rally, and she drives race cars. Jeremy Clarkson has been a good friend since she appeared on Top Gear and got the fastest time of the whole series – in fact, she thinks that Clarkson, or Jezza as she calls him, might make a good godparent to Indio. “As long as he doesn’t buy him any jeans or shirts or jackets,” she smiles.

Jodie says this has been an “amazing year” and you can tell she means it. After everything the Kidds have been through as a family, life finally seems to be settling down. “You know, Dad is on great form, top form. We’re an international family, that’s what we are, and we are lucky to be that.” She tells me that Indio has a Maserati baby seat, to match the car she she drives him round in. “I’m preaching about being this grounded mum, and there I am driving him around in a sports car. Oh goodness, he’s going to grow up to be a monster,” she laughs.

Will she calm down on the extreme activities now she is a mum? “The most extreme thing is changing a nappy. I got used to the projectile poo very quickly. I’m like a proper mum now. With any other child, I’d be gagging, but with him…” she pauses to laugh. “With him, it’s like, 'In’t it lovely, all that poo? Ahhh.’”

Olympia, The London International Horse Show is on December 13-19. Tickets on 0871 230 5580 or online at www.olympiahorseshow.com